Skye’s Limits (3 page)

“Well, I do this for a living, and you are a little too close to the situation to be impartial. You need to figure both of those in to the equation,” Alden reminded him.

“Then enlighten me.” Branson held out both of his arms.

“Skye is still carrying baggage from the night you guys were attacked by the Ravens.”

“How could he be? That was twenty years ago. He can’t possibly remember it.”

“Oh, can’t he? He told me today he remembers how he used to watch you and your dad go out and practice shooting.”

When Branson went a couple of shades paler, Alden knew he had hit home.

“He said that?” Branson asked.

“Yes, he also said he hid in a cupboard the night of the attack. He said he felt he should have been out there fighting with you instead,” Alden said.

“But he was only five then. How could he even think that?”

“I don’t know, but he does, and it’s been eating at him. Now, I don’t want you to bring this up to him yet.”

“Why not?” Branson demanded.

“Because I don’t want him to know that I told you. If you want me to keep working with him, he has to know that he can trust me and have my confidence. If you spill now, that will be ruined. Got it?”

Branson ran a hand through his hair, but he nodded his head. “Yeah, I got it. But damn, it’s going to be hard. I can’t believe that he’s been feeling bad about that.”

Alden noticed that Skye was coming their way. “I have to go now. We can talk more later if you want.”

“Yeah, thanks.”

Alden turned around and walked over to Skye.

“What did my brother want?” Skye asked before he began to nip at his bottom lip.

“Nothing. He was just checking up on you,” Alden said.

It was technically the truth. So why did he feel so damn guilty, and why was he having trouble meeting Skye’s gaze?

“Come on. It’s time for lunch.” Alden deliberately walked in front of Skye.

“Wait up. I can’t keep pace with your super legs,” Skye called out.

They went into the cafeteria, quickly got their food, and sat down. Some of Skye’s friends called out to him, but Alden guided Skye to a table made for two. If he had his say, Skye would be dumping those losers soon. He needed to be hanging out with guys like Xavier, Baxley, and Riley instead. They were the type of influence that Skye needed.

“Eat quickly, we still have a lot of work to do,” Alden said.

“Yes, sir,” Skye said.

At first, he thought Skye was being sarcastic, but when Skye began to eat instead of laughing, Alden realized he was serious. Alden gave him a droll stare.

“Alden will do just fine, thank you.”

Skye looked up. “I wasn’t for sure. You know, with you being my superior and all. I wanted to be proper.”

Alden just rolled his eyes. “Eat.”

Skye began to eat like it was his last meal. For as fast as he ate, at least he had manners. Alden had to give him points for that. Usually his trainees were so starved that they ate like animals.

As soon as they were finished, they took their trays up front and then went back to the training room. Once again, Alden pointed to the padding. “Put it back on because you’re going to need it.”

Skye let out a moan. “Why do I have a feeling that this is going to hurt again?”

Alden cocked a brow. “Because it is.”

At this point, trainees usually threw a fit, a few even walked out. Skye walked over and put the equipment back on. After he was done, he returned to Alden and said, “Okay, what’s next?”

The next morning when Skye woke up, he was so sore he could barely move. He tried getting out of bed, but it was like every muscle in his body was on fire. It felt like Satan’s hot finger of embers was touching Skye from head-to-toe. With some work and plenty of cussing, Skye somehow managed to roll his way to his feet, then shuffled his way to the bathroom. Turning the shower on its hottest setting in hopes that the heat would soothe his aches, he stepped under the spray. It helped some but not much.

By the time he got out, he saw he only had a few minutes to make it to the training center. Shit! The last thing he wanted to do was be late. That was a sure way to piss Alden off. Usually Skye couldn’t have cared less about something about that, but for some reason, he actually cared what the Tiger shifter thought about him. Which was crazy, since he’d only known Alden a day and usually Skye didn’t give a damn what others thought of him. He’d long ago built up a shield to protect him against others thoughts of him. But he couldn’t help it, with Alden it was different.

When Skye had first seen Alden, he’d expected to be afraid…and he was. But he’d also been turned on—a lot. Alden was nothing short of hot. While many might have been intimidated by the man’s dark-eyed gaze, Skye found it sexy. He also found himself wanting to run his hands through the man’s short dark hair and rub his hands up the guy’s body, which Skye knew was a taboo since he was his mentor. He wanted Alden bad, and he couldn’t help himself.

Skye somehow managed to get his clothes on, then get to the training center in time. Like the day before, Alden was waiting for him. And as before, he looked sinfully good. Skye sucked in a breath as he checked out his new trainer. Why-oh-why couldn’t they have stuck him with somebody that was ugly. It would have made it so much easier to hate the guy who was putting him through all this torture if he was hideous. Instead, Skye willingly went along because he was so busy drooling after Alden. Skye was putty in his hands. If Alden had asked him to jump through hoops of fire, Skye would have.

“How are you feeling this morning?” Alden asked.

Since Skye had been expecting to get orders instead of a question about his well-being, the question threw him off. So it took him a moment to answer.

“I’m sore as hell,” he admitted.

“Have you shifted?” Alden asked.

“Well…you see, there is an issue about that,” Skye hedged.

Alden cocked one dark brow. Skye noted he had a habit of doing that whenever he was displeased.

“What issue is that?” Alden asked.

“I still have trouble with shifting. I can do it but not so smoothly. It hurts,” Skye admitted.

He didn’t add that it also scared the hell out of him. He’d heard of some shifters who became stuck in their animal form and couldn’t come back. He didn’t want that to happen to him. While he liked his Lion, he liked his Skye better.

“Well, you’re going to do it now,” Alden said.

Fear clogged Skye’s throat. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t think that my statement was that confusing. Now, shift.”

“I just told you that I’m not that good at it,” Skye said.

Panic filled him. He didn’t want to shift. He would rather do anything but that. He would even rather go through a whole day of sparring minus the padding.

“You’re never going to get any better at it unless you practice, and we can’t work with all the pain you’re in right now. If you shift, you’ll feel better,” Alden said without an ounce of sympathy.

“They were right about you. You are mean,” Skye blurted.

“I’m not mean. I’m just tough on my trainees and expect the best out of them. I wouldn’t ask them to do anything I didn’t think they were capable of doing. I know you can do this.”

“But what if I get stuck as a Lion?” Skye asked, finally voicing his biggest fear.

“I won’t let that happen. Now, you have to trust me.”

Skye took a few deep breaths. Did he trust Alden? They had only met the day before. Alden was asking a lot of him. Skye thought that over in his head for several moments. In the end, he decided that, yes, he did trust Alden. After all, his brother wouldn’t have thrown him with somebody who didn’t know what they were doing.

“Okay, but you have to promise me you’ll help me if I get stuck,” Skye said.

Alden nodded. “I will. Now, I’m going to talk you through the shift, so it doesn’t hurt. From the sounds of it, you fear it, so it must be painful for you. You’ve been fighting it. You need to relax, and just let it take over. Close your eyes.”

Skye did as instructed. Wondering how in the hell that was going to help.

“Now, think of your Lion,” Alden said.

Skye did. As soon as he did, he began to tremble. He couldn’t help it, just the thought of having to shift scared him shitless.

“No, don’t fear it. Embrace it. It’s a part of you. It loves you, and you need to learn to love it. Think of all the freedom it gives you. Of all the stuff you can do while you’re in the Lion form. Of how powerful you are while you are an animal. How much stronger you are.”

Skye did that. He thought about how he could not be taken down so easily. How he could fight Ravens better. How if he had been a Lion the night of the attack, he could have saved Branson from ever being blinded. How he could have saved his parents. How he could have saved their lives from being fucked up.

To his amazement, he began to feel the shift take over. It didn’t hurt this time either. It was smooth and effortless. Before he knew it, he was in his Lion form. He paced around the training room a few times and even let out a roar of happiness.

Alden came up and petted Skye. “See? I knew you could do it.”

Skye gazed up at him. It was strange looking at Alden through his animal form. Everything seemed more vivid and intense. Even the scents were amplified. Wanting to get a better whiff of Alden, Skye brushed by him. Ah, yes! It was so nice. A dark, earthy smell. Skye likey.

“Okay, enough of the games. Time to shift back,” Alden said.

Skye felt a moment of panic. This was it. The big test. He let out a big huffing sound. If he got stuck like this he would never forgive Alden and he was so going to take such a big chunk out of Alden’s ass.

“Don’t act that way. You can do it,” Alden admonished. “All you have to do now is think of your human side.”

Skye closed his eyes and embraced his human side. He thought about not only himself, but of home, of family, of being back with Alden. Soon he could feel the shift take over again. This time was as easy as the last, and before he knew it, he was back in his human form.

Skye looked down at himself. Smoothing the wrinkles from his clothes. He still didn’t get why their clothes remained in place while they shifted, but then again, who was he to ask questions? He had just shifted into a Lion, so clothes were the least of the questions on his list of weirdness in his world.

“I did it, and it didn’t hurt at all,” Skye said in amazement.

He was so happy that he felt like doing a happy dance, but then he remembered Alden’s rules about no boogying. While Skye was pretty sure that only was for the shooting range, he wasn’t going to take any chances at pissing off his mentor.

Alden smiled, and it did all kinds of things to Skye’s insides. “See? I told you. It isn’t that hard once you stop fighting it and let the Lion take control. How do your muscles feel?”

Skye moved around a bit, surprised to find that he wasn’t sore at all anymore. “I feel great now.”

“Good, because you’re in for another day of hard work.”

Instead of feeling pissed at the thought of another day of grueling training, Skye was resigned to the fact. He actually was looking forward to it a little bit. After so many days of just laying around and doing nothing, it was kind of nice to do something productive with his life.

“Hey, I have a question for you,” Skye said.

He hoped that Alden wouldn’t laugh at him or make light of what he was he about to say. If he did, Skye didn’t think he could take it. After being marked as the coalition loser for so long, Skye would be destroyed if Alden thought of him in the same manner. Skye didn’t know why Alden’s opinion meant so much to him, but it did.

“What is it?” Alden asked.

“Do you think I would ever be good enough to be a coalition soldier?”

Skye braced himself for Alden’s answer. Alden paused a moment as he was thinking it over.

“With a little bit of training, I don’t see why not. You are a damn good shooter. You need a lot of work with hand-to-hand combat, but it’s not something that we can’t work with,” Alden finally said.

Skye couldn’t believe it. Not only had Alden not scoffed or laughed at his question, but he had actually said that there might be a chance. Suddenly Skye felt ten feet taller. For once in his life, he didn’t feel like a loser or the coalition stoner.

“You really think so?” Skye asked.

“Yeah, I do.”

“Everybody else thinks I’m just some loser.”

“That’s because you never gave them a chance to think otherwise. You need to show them that you’re something else. I know you can do it if you try hard enough.”

“Do you think they’ll even let me into the soldier training program?” Skye asked.

“With my recommendation, sure.”

Skye shook his head. “Nah, I don’t ever see it happening. To them, I’m just some stoner who is a fuckup.”

Alden stepped closer and put his fingers under Skye’s chin, forcing him to lock gazes with the trainer. Skye felt his breath halting as he found himself getting lost in Alden’s dark eyes.

“You have to prove them wrong,” Alden repeated slowly.

“I don’t know if I can. I’ve been such a fuckup for so long it might be too late,” Skye answered.

“It’s never too late. You changed my opinion on you.”

Skye swallowed hard. God, how he loved having Alden touching him even if it was just his fingers on Skye’s chin. The moment seemed so intimate, yet Skye had to be imagining it. There could be no way that Alden had any feelings toward him. Alden was his mentor. Plus, Alden was one of the best warriors in the coalition. Somebody that everybody looked up to. There was no way possible he could be interested in a loser like Skye.

“I have?” Skye asked, his voice filled with awe.

“Yes, I thought that I was going to be dealing with a petulant brat. Instead, you have been fulfilling all my expectations and then some.”

“It’s because I don’t want to become like Gage’s mother. The night before I came here, I realized that I needed help, and I knew that you were the only one who could give it to me. Sure, there were times when I wanted to argue, but I’m not only doing this for me. I’m doing it for Branson and Gage. Gage already had to live with one drunk. He shouldn’t have to live with another one,” Skye said.